


Some nights, I always win

by JHSC



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, Under the Red Hood
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Fusion, Angst, Bruce Wayne is Batman, Gen, Jason Todd is Red Hood, Lazarus Pit Madness, Mental Health Issues, Movie: Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker, Movie: Batman: Under the Red Hood, Reunions, Tim Drake is Robin
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-17
Updated: 2020-02-12
Packaged: 2021-02-27 11:28:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22286368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JHSC/pseuds/JHSC
Summary: On his way back to Gotham, Red Hood stops at the ruins of Arkham Asylum to lay some ghosts to rest.He picks up something else.
Relationships: Tim Drake & Jason Todd
Comments: 136
Kudos: 820
Collections: Red Hood vs Red Robin





	1. Well, some nights, I wish that this all would end

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, if you really want to ruin your night, watch "Under the Red Hood" followed immediately by "Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker." 
> 
> And then, fic.

It's fucking _raining_ when Jason arrives in Gotham. Not a soft spring rain, one that revives growing things and washes away the grime, the stench of garbage, the soot and smog clinging to every corner of the city. Tonight's rain is black and cold as balls, alternating between near-frozen droplets that creep under Jason's jacket collar, and hard sleet that ricochets off his helmet like bullets as he drives his motorcycle up to the broken gates of Arkham.

Before Crime Alley, before Blackgate, before the _Cave_ or the fucking _Manor_ , before he gets ready to set all his complicated plans into motion, Jason goes to Arkham just so he can lay some goddamn ghosts to _rest_. He knows already that it's been closed in the time since he was murdered in Ethiopia, the remaining inmates transferred to other, newer facilities. Places with more advanced security systems. Places with functional ethics committees. Places that might actually help patients, rather than abuse them and break them and give them no other recourse but chaotic, mad violence.

All that's left of the original asylum now is a dark, concrete ruin shadowed against the cliff face with every flash of lightning, still echoing with the screams of those long since silenced. Jason stares up at it, ignoring the melodramatic weather, and tries to wrap his mind around the destruction and decay of a place so central to his previous life. 

This is where the Joker was sent, every time they captured him. This is where Joker sulked and schemed, weaving his twisted plans out of mistreatment and boredom and spite. 

This is the place Joker escaped from, only to be caught by the Bat and summarily returned yet again. Over and over again, the same pattern revolving day after day, week after week, for years on end. Until the pattern changed. 

The Joker killed Robin.

Batman killed Arkham.

Jason realizes with a start that the screams echoing across the asylum grounds aren't just the wind or a twisted piece of memory. Arkham is supposed to be abandoned, but someone, someone real and alive and scared as fuck, is screaming within it.

"What the hell?" Jason mutters, checking that his guns are secure in their holsters before jumping the gates and starting the long trek up the drive.

It takes twenty minutes of searching, the broken walls and collapsed staircases making the sounds fracture and reverberate oddly, leading him down frequent dead-end hallways full of dust and dry leaves and ghosts, before he finally finds it. A windowless room, near the center of the building, where the roof is still mostly intact, offering protection from the storm.

The electricity is supposed to have been cut off, but there are lights on. A radio playing the golden oldies. Movement, steps, harsh breathing.

As the Shangri-La’s croon about the leader of the pack committing suicide, Jason approaches silently, sneaking up a broken stairwell to a mezzanine overlooking the old surgical suite. He peeks over the side and sees, tied to an exam table tilted upright, blood dripping from the corner of his mouth — himself.

No, not himself — Robin. The new goddamn Robin in his old colors. The _replacement_ Robin.

The third name on his kill list. 

The sight makes rage course along his nerves, forces a sickly miasma cloud over his vision, and gives him the sudden urge to grab his guns and start shooting until the struggling body in front of him pours as much blood into the Robin uniform as Jason did the last time he wore it. 

And then a figure steps into the light, shiny green hair and plague-white skin and a red rictus of a smile, like a slash from a serrated knife, and— Jason's lungs lock up, and his bones ache, and his blood freezes in his veins, and he hears the Joker cheerfully — always cheerful, always bubbly as a tar pit — say, "Well then, sonny boy, what's it going to be?"

The replacement's voice is raw from screaming, but resolute as he says, "No."

"No?" the Joker asks, as if he’s fucking shocked. "All that effort, and it's still a no?"

The replacement says nothing. But Jason can see his fists clench, knuckles the color of bone.

"Well then. We'll just have to try something else, won't we?" the Joker says, and the way he says it makes something uncomfortable churn in Jason’s gut. The replacement is doomed. The kid is fucking doomed. Joker has it in for him, has him tied down, drugged to hell, uniform shredded and domino mask nowhere to be found. A dead man struggling. 

Jason can’t do anything but watch, paralyzed by duelling desires, rage and empathy, knowledge and terror, vengeance and _being Robin gives me magic—_

The Joker raises his arm and he's holding a crowbar — no, a gun, green as acid and just as deadly. He's pointing a gun at Robin's face, six inches away, a guaranteed kill shot, and Jason's heart is in his throat because he's about to see _another_ Robin die at the Joker’s hands, alone and helpless and bleeding, and before Jason can decide, can act, can _move,_ the Joker pulls the trigger.

A cloud of purple gas streams out the end, clouding Robin's face.

"Compound number fifty-three," the Joker announces, tossing the gun onto a nearby surgical tray, already covered with the detritus of torture. "I call it Chatty Gas."

Robin's face is turning red from holding his breath, trying not to inhale the fumes.

"Now, now, none of that," the Joker scolds, and sucker-punches Robin in the solar plexus, right below the yellow 'R'. 

Robin gasps, bending over as much as he can in his restraints, and inhales, and coughs, and coughs, and coughs.

"By my calculations, the Chatty Gas should kick in almost instantly. So tell me, little cuckoo bird: What is your name?"

"Robin," the boy says, still wheezing, eyes squeezed shut in a grimace against the pain.

"Wrong-o!" the Joker sings, casually backhanding the kid in a way Jason is far too familiar with. The light in the room changes, the green overlay fading. "Give me your _real_ name."

Robin gasps, and then, so quietly Jason can barely hear it from twenty feet away, groans, "Tim."

"There, was that so hard now, Timmy boy?” the Joker consoles. “Only took three days to get it out of you. I'll mark down Chatty Gas as a success."

The Joker turns his head towards the double doors at the back of the room and calls out, "Sweetums! Bring us a slice of cake! We've had a breakthrough!"

"Comin' right up, Mista J!" Harley Quinn's voice echoes in from the next room.

The Joker turns back to the kid — Tim, _Robin_ — and backhands him again, almost as an afterthought. "Honestly, they just don't make Robins like they used to. At this point your predecessor would still be trying to rip my throat out with his teeth. Such a shame."

“Don’t…” Robin wheezes, jaw tightening, like he’s offended on Jason’s behalf. Like he _cares_ about the Robin he replaced. “Don’t talk about him.”

“What was that, kiddo?” the Joker asks, cupping his hand to his ear, voice smooth as gun oil. “Don’t talk about him? Don’t talk about my greatest achievement, luring Batman’s protege into my trap and giving him exactly what he deserved?”

He looms over the kid, leans down until their faces are bare inches apart, and every trace of syrupy sweetness is eviscerated when he says, “ _You_ don’t give _me_ orders, boy.”

If the kid had a little more wiggle room, a little more strength, a bit fewer drugs dulling his system, then his attempt to smash his forehead into the Joker’s nose would have been a great fucking move. Here and now, the Joker dodges it easily, laugh echoing shrilly across the cement. “The last Robin was too stupid to see through my little trap, and now here you are, even dumber than he was. Why Batsy even picked you, I guess I’ll never know.”

“He didn’t.”

Jason freezes, at that. So does the Joker. “He didn’t?”

Robin takes a heaving breath like it hurts. His voice starts to slur. “Made him… take me. He didn’t want me. Made him.”

“Timmy-boy,” the Joker croons, curiosity filling his voice as his hand trails over the the tools laid out on the table next to Tim. “Did you _blackmail_ the Big Black Bat just for the chance to play dress-up on the rooftops?”

Robin shakes his head, once. The slurring worsens the more he talks. “Had to stop him. Spiralling. Was gonna… get himself killed. He didn’t... didn’t care. I did. Couldn’t replace Jason but… could keep… keep B alive. For a while.”

“Pity old Batsy can’t ever seem to return the favor, eh?” the Joker says, tapping his index finger against his chin consideringly.

“Fuck off,” Robin mumbles, head hanging in exhaustion.

Jason catches his breath. He’s… he’s got to—

What happens next is nearly a blur. 

The Joker steps forward to backhand Robin again, since he loves that move so very much. Robin turns his head with the blow, absorbing it. Then suddenly, one of his hands is free, and he’s using it to break the Joker’s nose with a palm strike, shove him away, and start scrabbling to release the shackle clamped to his other wrist.

The Joker straightens, blood streaming bright, bright red down his face, and Jason knows without a doubt, knows from bleak experience, that it’s murder shining, glaring blindingly from Joker’s eyes. He growls, reaches for the knife on the table—

— And Jason finds his vision clearing, and he takes a stand, and he pulls out his guns, and he shoots the knife out of the Joker’s hand before the Joker even knows he’s there.

The Joker dives for cover, and it’s barely a moment before Harley runs in, shrieking and spraying the balcony with machine gun fire, and Jason’s shooting back, jumping down from the balcony onto the operating room floor. 

Bullets ricochet around the room, sending concrete chips flying and shaking dust down from the rafters. The Joker and Harley dive for cover as Jason unloads clip after clip in their direction, sprinting from one hiding place to another.

A sharp cry from behind him breaks through the cacophony in Jason’s ears, and he pauses, turning back for a moment to check on Robin. 

That’s all the time it takes for the Joker to grab Harley around the waist, throw her over his shoulder, and escape through a side door. Their footsteps fade, and then an engine roars, and all of it takes place within the span of a minute or less, and then it’s over.

The Joker is gone. Alive, but gone, and Jason is left behind again.

Jason’s shoulders slump. He re-holsters his guns, and turns to look at Robin.

The kid has gotten himself untied from the exam table, but just barely, and is collapsed on the damp floor beside it.

Jason rushes over to him. His hands hover for a moment, uncertain, and then he reaches down and pushes the kid onto his back, revealing a ragged bullet hole at the top of his thigh.

“Fuck,” Jason mutters, mind spinning as he dredges up the first aid training Batman had required, and then made extensive use of.

The word is enough to shock the kid out of his daze. He looks up at Jason’s helmet and freaks. The fuck. Out. Scrambling at the floor, trying to shove himself away, staring at the helmet like it’s the face of the devil himself.

“Hey, hey,” Jason says, hands up in what he hopes is a calming gesture. How many fucking drugs has this kid had pumped into him? “It’s fine, you’re safe, look—”

He slowly reaches up and presses the hidden release, then pulls the helmet off.

Robin freezes — literally freezes, not taking even a single breath for long, long seconds as he takes in Jason’s face, his terrible helmet hair, the white streak above his forehead that serves as a daily reminder of all the ways Jason has changed over the last four years.

And then the kid says, “Jason?”

It’s Jason’s turn to be shocked speechless, but the kid doesn’t give him a moment to recover before babbling, “Jason Todd, oh my god— You died, how can you be— How did you— Oh god, it was the Lazarus Pit, someone put you in the Lazarus Pit— Are you okay? The Pit Madness— you have to— the Pit Madness—”

The pool of blood beneath Robin’s body begins to spread worryingly. Jason grabs his wildly gesturing hands, stilling them, and says, “Take a breath, kid!”

Robin, amazingly, listens. He breathes once, twice. And then starts right back up again with, “Are you having symptoms of the Pit Madness? B’s records are sketchy, but it’s characterized by paranoia, delusions, revenge fantasies, overwhelming rage—”

“Tim!” Jason interrupts. “Yeah, I was put in a Lazarus Pit and yeah, all that sounds kinda familiar, but we can talk about that later, because your bullet wound is a _slightly more pressing matter_.”

Tim looks down at his leg, like he’s surprised to find that there’s a huge fucking hole blown perilously close to his femoral artery. He pales. “Oh.”

“Yeah, _oh_ ,” Jason says, already applying his belt as a tourniquet just above the wound. He tightens it, and Tim groans, but the bleeding slows.

“I hate bullet wounds,” Tim rasps, voice shaky. 

“Welcome to the club, we’ve got jackets,” Jason says. “You gonna freak out again if I put my helmet back on?”

“I’ll try… not to.”

“Good enough.” Jason pulls the helmet back on, then hoists Tim into his arms and starts jogging back to where he parked his bike.

Back to the Batcave.


	2. Some nights, I'm scared you'll forget me again

Jason and his bloody burden lurch into the Batcave with a painful squeal of tires and a choking cloud of dust and motorcycle exhaust. 

He hadn’t planned to see Bruce tonight, had thought he was prepared to face Bruce without feeling like a damn ten-year-old again, but there Bruce is, cowl down, standing up from the Batcomputer straight into a fighting stance, and, and Jason pushes everything down and yells, “He’s in shock! Call Alfred, now!” 

“How did you—?” 

“—Injured Robin here! Less questions, more emergency medicine!” Jason says, cutting Bruce off mid-sentence. He slides off the bike, Tim in his arms, and dashes toward the medbay. It’s been upgraded since the last time he was here — more lights, more cabinets, more storage — and Jason sets Tim down gently on the nearest gurney. 

Bruce appears at his side. “What. Happened.” 

“The fuck do you think?” Jason spits out. “The Joker happened.” 

Of course, Bruce doesn’t respond to that, just starts checking Tim’s vitals like Jason isn’t even there. 

“He lost about two pints of blood from the GSW,” Jason adds, because this is information Bruce and Alfred need to have if they’re going to manage to keep this Robin alive to reach voting age. Or even driving age, from the look of him. “I saw him get hit with a gas they called compound fifty-three. Don’t know what else he might’ve been exposed to before that.” 

Bruce nods without looking away from what he’s doing. Jason takes another glance around the medbay, then steps over to the refrigerator in the corner that has a bright yellow biohazard symbol emblazoned on the front. Inside are bags of saline, and of blood. 

“O negative,” Bruce calls out. 

Jason grabs two of the corresponding blood bags and brings them over, hooking them onto the stand next to the gurney. He pretends he’s someone else, someone helpful and steady, someone who doesn’t hate where he is, doesn’t hate who he’s with, doesn’t hate what he’s doing, and asks, “What next?” 

Bruce looks up at him, gaze assessing even though, with the helmet still on, there’s nothing of Jason to assess. “Now, you step away.” 

“What?” Jason yelps, suddenly wrongfooted, even though he knows Bruce shouldn’t trust him with so much as a band-aid when it comes to Robin’s care. “I can help!” 

“You can wait out in the cave until I’m ready to ask why you know as much as you do,” Bruce responds. 

The rage comes on unexpectedly, careening through him in a green whirlwind. “You can’t do this alone, you’ve only got two hands! He’s going to die because you’re a stupid, stubborn asshole who _doesn’t listen!”_

A hand rests on Jason’s shoulder, then, and it’s Alfred — dear, dear Alfred — who chides, “That will be quite enough, sir. Please remove yourself to the cave at once.” 

Jason shrugs off Alfred’s hand and, with every ounce of effort he can muster, makes himself turn and stomp out of the medbay. The sliding glass doors seal behind him, locking him out. Taking a few more steps, he turns to look. Sees that Tim’s been intubated already. Fresh blood is flowing down a tube into his arm. Bruce is cutting away the Robin uniform while Alfred inspects the gunshot wound. They’re busy. They don’t need him. 

They’re busy. They don’t need him. 

The Batcomputer is right there. It’s still on whatever screen Bruce was looking at when Jason blew in on his bike, one hand on the handlebar and one pressed to the pulse point in Tim’s neck. The Batcomputer is right there, Bruce and Alfred are bullet-deep in Tim’s leg, and Jason… Jason has some fucking _questions._

He pulls up the menu, and starts searching for anything and everything Bruce has on the Lazarus Pit. 

What he finds is… not great. 

What he finds is _fucking awful._

Talia’d said the Lazarus Pit had healed all his wounds. She’d said it had sampled his DNA and reset his body to its original genetic structure, clearing up old scars, repairing injuries recent and not-so-recent, and most importantly, fixed whatever fucking traumatic brain injuries he’d received by crowbar, by explosion, by death. 

She’d said the Lazarus Pit had restored him, whole. 

She never said it’d taken something from him in payment for the miracle. 

It’s all there in the files. Pulled from first-hand interviews, second-hand retellings, and written accounts dating back centuries. Of people healed by the Lazarus Pits. People who’d then gone mad. 

Tim had babbled about the symptoms of Pit Madness — Lazarus Syndrome — and Jason had been struck by how familiar it sounded, but tried to ignore it. The kid had been drugged and beaten and shot, after all, so what the hell could he know? 

Now, side effects laid out in front of him on the computer screen, Jason has to admit the kid might be onto something. 

Paranoia: He’s spent the last however-many-years with the League of Assassins, paranoia is a necessary survival skill. 

Distrust: See above. 

Violent urges and delusions, obsession with revenge: Jason was _murdered_ , and Bruce has done _nothing_ , and the Joker is alive and free and going after _another Robin_ , and he needs to _show_ Bruce, he needs to show him… 

Jason reads— 

_Victims unilaterally exhibit overwhelming feelings of hatred, betrayal, and rejection, predominantly directed toward the most important relationship in the victim’s life, such as a spouse, partner, sibling, or parent. It is theorized that the destabilization of these relationships serves to further strengthen the Lazarus Syndrome’s power over the victim, causing them to become more malleable, suggestible, and easy to manipulate into further violence._

—and shoves himself away from the computer, nausea crawling up his throat side-by-side with absolute, devastating, heart-stopping terror. 

He thought he was _right_. 

He thought he was right, and Bruce was wrong, and the Joker was alive, and all that matters is taking his revenge on Bruce. But why _Bruce_? Why focus all these plans, all these twisted, tortuous machinations designed to torment and take down _Bruce_ — and the Joker, the man who had _actually killed Jason_ , was just an afterthought, a footnote? The Joker had… had gone after Jason, had lured him with the promise of rescuing his birth mother, dangled the prospect of family and unconditional acceptance in front of his nose and then beat— it— out— of— him and blew up them both while he _laughed and laughed and…_

And yet all Jason wanted to do was punish _Bruce…._

Oh fuck. Oh _fuck_. 

He’s got every single fucking symptom of the Lazarus Syndrome. He has it. He has it and he’s gone nuts. He was dumped in the acid-green of the pit to restore his mind, but it didn’t, really, his mind is still _wrong_ just in a different way, and he almost— he nearly— 

Jason’s mask pings. The alert that he’s hyperventilating. He’s going to pass out if he doesn’t make himself breathe, make himself relax, make himself push past the panic and make himself _calm the fuck down you stupid shit_. 

He breathes. He counts. He breathes. 

When the tightness in his chest loosens, and his hands unclench, Jason decides on an experiment. Because. If his reasoning is compromised. He can’t assume his conclusions are solid. He needs to check. 

He imagines Bruce and the Joker, fighting. Bruce having the chance to make the killing blow. Bruce refusing it. 

There — the rage. The green haze, matching the acid of the Pit. The prospect of punishing Bruce for his betrayal grows, tendrils of hate reaching into every corner of Jason’s psyche. 

It takes effort, so, so much effort, to shift the image. To rewrite the story in his mind. To remember Tim, tattered and torn and bleeding and broken, staring up at Jason with wonder and hope and awe. The way he said Jason’s name. Like his survival was a miracle. 

Jason’s vision brightens. The green curtain pulls back. He’s left sitting in the cave, staring up at the chittering colony of bats nested among the stalactites. 

He used to try to count them, as a child. 

He used to name them. 

The medbay door slides open behind him. He doesn’t hear Bruce approach. Then he’s there. 

“How’s the kid?” Jason asks quietly. 

“He’ll pull through,” Bruce replies. 

Jason shakes his head. He’s… he’s got a lot to think about. A lot to process. And he can’t do that here, with Bruce looking at him like a stranger, a threat. “Well, if that’s all, I’ll just be heading out—” 

He takes a step toward his motorcycle, but only a step. Bruce’s hand on his shoulder stops him going any further, grip like a vice, unyielding and undeniable. His voice is just as cold. “How did you know where to find Robin?” 

“I didn’t — found him by accident. _You’re welcome_.” 

Bruce doesn’t let go and doesn’t let up. “How did you know to bring him here?” 

Jason shrugs under the hand, trying to focus on staying calm, keeping his sight free and clear of the monochrome of the Pit. “He’s Robin, isn’t he?” 

“How did you know how to get into the cave?” 

“The kid directed me,” Jason lies. He can’t stay here. He’s trying so hard. He can feel the rage, the urge to hit and hit and hit, and he doesn’t know how much longer he can keep it at bay. He doesn’t _want_ to hit Bruce, he’s sure he doesn’t, he _doesn’t_. 

“Robin was unconscious for at least twenty minutes before arriving here,” Bruce retorts, and of course he can tell shit like that, the fuckin’ smart aleck. “Now, give me some _answers_.” 

“I don’t answer to _you_ , old man.” Jason jerks away, breaking free for a moment, but only just. 

Then his back collides with the cold stone wall of the cave, and Bruce’s hands are fisted in the collar of Jason’s leather jacket, pulling it tight against his throat, and for just a moment, Jason can’t breathe. 

“You know Robin’s real name,” Bruce growls, but it’s not Bruce, it’s Batman — Batman when something of his has been threatened. “You know Alfred’s, I assume you know mine. You know how to get into the cave. You’re carrying at least four guns, probably more, and you showed up here with my son, who has been missing for four days and has a _bullet wound_ , so yes, whoever you are, you _do_ answer to me!” 

“I can’t,” Jason gasps. The leather of his jacket creaks as Batman clenches it tighter, and the world is turning green — but he can’t, it can’t — he tries to remember Tim, Tim who was happy he’s alive, Tim who’s been the only person on this miserable planet that’s happy he’s alive and they’ve never even _met_ before— 

“How did you find us?” Batman demands. 

“I didn’t—” 

“Don’t lie to me!” Batman growls, shoving Jason harder against the wall, making his helmet crack against the stone. The sound echoes. A dozen bats drop from their perches and flap further into the cave. 

“Stop,” Jason rasps. 

Jason has more than four guns. Jason has a pistol concealed in his left sleeve on a spring-loaded holster. 

Another shake. “Tell me what I want to know!” 

Jason has a pistol, and with a twist of his thumb and a flick of his wrist, it’ll fly into his hand. He’ll unload a half-dozen bullets into Bruce’s chest before the echo of the first shot makes its way up the tunnels and into the Manor. 

“Stop.” 

_“Tell me!”_

Jason keeps his hands still, shoves the hate as far away as he can, and — like he’s twelve again, like he’s fifteen again, panicking and in trouble and at the end of his fucking rope — he cries, “ _Dad, stop!_ ” 

Silence. 

Space. 

There’s space around him, all of a sudden. 

Bruce has let go. Bruce has backed away. 

Jason slides down the wall until he’s sitting on the floor of the cave, eyes closed, head in his hands. His head hurts. Everything hurts. Why does everything have to hurt so much? 

He hears Bruce crouch down in front of him. Hears him tentatively ask, “...Dick?” 

A pained chuckle escapes Jason’s throat, unbidden. Of course. Of course that’s what Bruce would guess. Because that’s the only option. Tim is unconscious in the medbay. Jason is supposed to be in the ground, quiet and still and rotting away, and it’s a cruel twist of fate that he’s not. 

“You know Dick couldn’t…” Jason stutters, squeezing his eyes tight. “Dick couldn’t ever pull off wearing red.” 

Jason glances up, and Bruce looks… 

Bruce looks _broken_. Broken in a way Jason’s never seen before. He reaches out trembling hands, places them on either side of Jason’s helmet. Jason releases the catches, and Bruce lifts it up and off, and drops it to the ground beside them. It rolls a short distance away before settling against the wheels of the computer chair. 

Then Bruce’s gloves are gone, and he’s cupping Jason’s cheeks with his bare hands, tilting his face up, and Bruce stares and stares and stares and Jason stares back because it’s impossible to look away, because the hope and wonder and awe that Tim radiated an hour ago is shining out tenfold from Bruce’s damp eyes, and Bruce’s voice trembles when he says, “Jay?” 

Jason swallows down the lump in his throat and says, “Surprise.”


	3. But I still wake up, I still see your ghost

*

There's an agonized shout behind him, and Jason finds himself spinning, pulling into a defensive stance as he looks for the source of the sound. 

It takes him a moment to realize he's standing in the middle of the medbay. He's in the medbay, and his feet are cold because his boots are gone, and the skin at his wrists is bare and chafed and reddened because his body armor is gone, and there's pain in his knuckles because his gloves are gone, and — and Tim is collapsed on the floor, tangled in wires and tubes like he'd tried to get out of the bed and failed miserably, and — and — 

"So help me, God, were you trying to walk on that leg, kid?" Jason demands, lowering his hands and stepping forward. 

Tim's body jerks, not so much a flinch as a full-bodied attempt to escape a threat, eyes wide and heels pushing uselessly against the floor. Jason freezes. 

"I thought we established I'm not gonna hurt you," Jason says. _God_ , the floor of the medbay is cold. Bruce needs to install some fucking heated flooring if he's going to let his Robins run around getting shot all the time. 

"Just me, then?" Tim asks, glancing at something behind Jason. 

Jason turns. 

Alfred. 

Alfred is behind him, lip bleeding and swollen, blood seeping into the grey of his mustache ad he stands there and watches Jason warily. Alfred is bleeding. Someone punched Alfred in the face within the past five minutes and— 

—and Jason knows why his knuckles hurt. 

He looks down at his hands, as if to confirm. Back up to Alfred. 

"No, I…" He swallows past the boulder blocking his throat. Watches the streak of crimson blood grow, swollen and devastating as a flooded river breaking free of a dam. "No, I… I was in the cave. Bruce took off my helmet and, and… How did…?" 

"That was last night," Alfred explains. His voice is flat. Cold as the floor beneath their feet. "I'm afraid I felt the need to tranquilize you as a precaution, pending confirmation of your identity. You woke up several minutes ago." 

Jason remembers it in a flash: staring at Bruce, looking at him face to face for the first time in years, then the sudden pain in his neck, sharp and piercing and spreading numbness throughout his body with every pump of his heart. He hadn’t had time to say a word before falling forward, caught in Bruce’s arms, and he couldn't speak and he couldn't see and he couldn't feel his body anymore. 

The last sense he'd lost was his hearing, the sound of Bruce shouting, Alfred’s voice utterly calm and completely unrepentant as he said, “My apologies, Master Bruce. I thought it best to forestall a potential infiltration while you are emotionally compromised.” 

"I remember the tranq," Jason says slowly, reaching up to check the injection site on his neck. It is very tender. "Thanks a lot for that. Is that why I'm missing time?" 

"You had an episode of the Pit Madness as soon as you woke up," Tim explains. He's sat up, at least, propped himself up against the side of the bed, bandaged leg stretched out in front of him. "You were in restraints. You ripped out of them." 

Jason's breath catches. He doesn't remember. He doesn't remember waking up, doesn't know what he thought or said or did, but he can see the torn velcro straps on the other bed, can see the blood trailing down Alfred's chin, can see the cautious look in Tim's eyes. He was — he was talking to Bruce and then there is nothing but a faint green haze until he heard the sound of Tim falling and — and woke up. 

"It's okay, Jason." 

It's Bruce who says it. Bruce, who's standing in the doorway now, when he wasn't there a moment ago. Bruce is in the doorway, Alfred is in the middle of the room, Tim is _still on the fucking floor_ and Jason is, somehow he's backed against the wall, back in the corner by the biohazard fridge, and he doesn't know how he got there. 

His hands are shaking. 

All of him is shaking. 

"It's okay, Jason," Bruce repeats. Maybe he's said it more than twice. Jason doesn't know. "It's okay. Alfred is all right. Tim will be all right." 

"Not if you leave him on the goddamned floor all night, he won't be," Jason snaps. "You'd better check his fucking stitches, I didn't drag him all the way back here just to have him throw a clot and stroke out." 

Bruce nods, and walks — slowly, unthreatening — over to Tim. He crouches down, but with the bandages and tubes and other medical detritus, it's not an easy lift, even with Alfred at his side. 

Jason shuffles over to try and be of use, and is brushed off with, "We've got him, Jay." 

"I can help," Jason protests. "B—" 

"It's okay—" 

"I know it's not okay, but for God's sake, let me help!" Jason snaps. 

Bruce and Alfred exchange a look, impossible to miss. Jason knows it's less due to his entire past history and identity, and more because his mood is swinging like a pendulum. Anger to worry and back again. Unpredictable and violent. Untrustworthy. 

Tim clears his throat. 

"If you would lower the bed rail for us, Master Jason," Alfred instructs. 

Jason does as asked, then darts around to the far side of the bed and moves wires and tubes out of the way as the two men lift Tim and set him gently back onto the mattress. 

"A bag of saline, please," Bruce says once Tim is settled and arranged to his liking. "And an ice pack for Alfred's pride." 

"Don't you mean his face?" Jason asks, already heading for the fridge. He can't look at that face, though, can't look at the hurt he knows he caused, even if he doesn't remember doing it. 

"You spent how many years in the service, Alfred, and no one ever bested you in a fight?" Bruce says, a twist of amusement coloring his voice. "But it's the tied up and drugged nineteen-year-old who finally manages to draw blood?" 

Alfred sniffs disdainfully. He takes the ice pack and paper towel that Jason hands him a moment later. Before he applies it, he says, "I would barely call that a fight, Master Bruce. More an unfortunate accident." 

Bruce smiles. "Keep telling yourself that." 

Feeling like a shamefaced twelve-year-old caught tracking mud into the foyer again, Jason says, "Sorry, Alfred." 

Alfred looks at him again, piercing and wary and assessing, like he can see every punch Jason has ever thrown writ large on his face, can see every body he broke and every life he took at the command of the al Ghul family incised across his heart. And then his expression clears, and it's just Alfie, good old Alfie, who says, "You are quite forgiven, Master Jason. Please try not to do it again." 

Jason nods, and Alfred turns back to Tim and Tim's bandages, but Bruce — Bruce is still staring at him. Maybe he hasn't stopped, not really. His eyes are still glowing — with happiness, with hope, with a thousand emotions Jason can hardly remember the feel of, the names for — and Jason just… doesn't know what to do about it. 

His feet are still bare. Still cold. 

He climbs back onto the second bed and sits, knees pulled up to his chest, tucking the blankets over and around his legs until every possible draft of cold air is blocked. 

Bruce follows him over. Asks, "May I sit?" 

Jason shrugs and nods. 

Bruce sits. Reaches out a hand and rests it on the top of Jason's left foot. Jason can feel the warmth of his palm even through the bedding. 

Bruce asks, voice gentle like it is when he's talking to a scared child, talking to a child Jason woken up by a nightmare, "It was… the Lazarus Pit?" 

Jason shrugs, keeping his gaze on Bruce's hand so he doesn't have to see his face. "As far as I know." 

Bruce asks, even more gently, “The Pit Madness?” 

Jason shrugs, then nods. "The kid figured it out before I did. While he was bleeding out, even." 

He glances over at the other bed. Tim looks like he's been put back under. Alfred has left the medbay. It's just him and Bruce, now. 

Bruce squeezes his foot, directing Jason’s gaze back up to meet his. “Jay-lad,” he says. It’s not a question. 

“I want to kill you,” Jason says, not breaking eye contact, no matter how much he wants to. 

He has to watch how Bruce takes what he has to say. He has to know where they stand, put everything on the table, because his heart is tangled up in hate and love and fear and pain, and _feelings of hatred, betrayal, and rejection, predominantly directed toward the most important relationship…_

He is so, so angry. 

“I want to kill the new Robin," he confesses, watching Bruce's eyes, waiting for that warm glow to flicker out and die. "I want to make you kill the Joker. I want to…. I want to take over Crime Alley, I want to kill all the drug lords and take their place, and control distribution so that no one ever deals to kids again, and I want to kill anyone who stands in my way and—” 

Bruce hasn’t grimaced, or turned away, or shut down. He’s staring straight back at Jason like he doesn’t care, like he’s not even hearing it, like he could hear Jason confess to _anything_ and still look at him with so much— 

Jason’s face is wet. He doesn’t realize, not until the pads of Bruce’s thumbs are wiping away the tears spilling down his cheeks. “—and I think I’ve gone crazy, Dad, and I don't know what to do anymore.” 

“Your body and mind were violated, Jay. It’s not your fault.” 

Jason shakes his head and pulls away, tightening his arms around his knees. “My fault or not, I’m still—” 

He looks over at the other bed. “Until the kid started talking, I was gonna just watch and let the Joker kill him, as a lesson to you.” 

"A lesson?" Bruce asks. Like he's confused. Like he doesn't understand. 

Jason closes his eyes and breathes. Focuses on breathing. So that he can ask the question that's haunted him, that's driven him for so long, so that after the warehouse and the crowbar and the bomb and the grave and the Pit, he can finally hear the answer. 

"Why didn't you kill the Joker?" Bruce stiffens beside him, and Jason barrels onward, desperate to get it all out. "I have to know. He took me from you, he murdered me, and you — I was starting to believe I _mattered_ to you, but you didn't avenge me? Why didn't you avenge me?" 

"We don't kill, Jason," Bruce says, and— 

Jason snaps, "That's not an answer, and you know it!" 

Bruce lifts a hand towards him again, and Jason flinches back. If Bruce touches him now, distracts him with comfort and love so that he can conveniently sidestep the question, Jason can't guarantee any of them will walk out of this cave alive. 

"Just tell me," Jason begs, now. "I need to understand. Make me understand." 

Bruce closes his eyes for a moment and sighs. He looks back up at Jason and asks, "Do you know how many people are killed by law enforcement each year?" 

"No," Jason says. "But I'm sure you're about to tell me." 

"I can't tell you," Bruce says, shaking his head, "because police departments are not required to report the numbers to any higher authority." 

Jason mirrors the headshake. Twists and turns and deflections, always. "What's your point, B?" 

"People are killed by police every day, without judge, jury, or defense attorney—" 

"You're not the police! You're a vigilante— you're Batman, you work _outside_ the law, that's— that's the whole _point_." 

"Yes. I'm Batman," Bruce says, and for once, he doesn't sound proud of it. "People watch everything I do. They take their cues from me. What do you think happens, when word gets out that Batman killed someone?" 

Jason grips his knees tightly, like a vice around his calves, so he doesn't reach for Bruce's throat "The rest of Gotham's criminals decide to retire go into the home renovation business?" 

"It would start a free-for-all, Jay," Bruce says. "If Batman kills one person in cold blood, that cascades to other vigilantes thinking that killing is acceptable, and then non-vigilantes will start doing it, and then the police will _keep_ doing it and argue that it's justified." 

"So what?" Jason asks. "People kill people all the time, cops kill people all the time, what's it really going to change — other than get one of those killers off the streets?" 

"I didn't leave the Joker alive because I think he's capable of redemption, or because I think I'm too good to kill." Bruce's hands clench, then fall limp at his sides, like he's lost every iota of energy he's ever had. "He stole my child from me, I wanted him to die. _I_ wanted to die." 

Bruce pauses, staring out the sliding glass medbay doors into the dark of the cave for a moment, and for a moment his eyes and his face are as empty as Jason's grave. Then he shakes his head, comes back to himself, and says, "But I couldn't do it, because I couldn't create a Gotham where any child in a hoodie could become the next Trayvon." 

Jason's breath catches. He remembers that. He remembers when that happened, how livid he was, how he'd begged Bruce to let him skip school and go down to Florida and _do something_. "That wouldn't happen, Bruce, that guy— he was arrested. I remember, they sent him to jail." 

"He got out, Jay-lad," Bruce explains, and his voice has gentled again. "He went to trial after you… after you died. He was acquitted. They let him go." 

Jason ducks his head and punches the mattress hard, twice, three times. He wishes it was the cold, hard floor of the cave. He wishes it was Bruce's face. He breathes, and focuses on the sensation, the air entering his lungs, chest rising and falling in synch with every breath. 

Bruce sits with him, waiting patiently while Jason pulls himself together. Like he has all the time in the world. 

When Jason finally calms, Bruce says, "You have always mattered to me. And Gotham has always mattered to you. I couldn't let your city turn into your nightmare just to indulge my thirst for revenge." 

*


	4. The dream I just had about you and me

Jason rests his head on his knees, and tries to breathe, to _think_. 

“I don’t believe you,” he finally says, not raising his head. He can’t look anymore. “I don’t— it’s just— you _say_ that but everything in my head is just, just _screaming_ that you don’t care, that you’re wrong, that I can’t trust you, and it sounds so _right_ that I know, I know now that it probably _isn’t_ , but—” 

“What can I do to prove it to you?” Bruce asks. His hand is on the back of Jason’s neck. It’s soothing, and makes Jason’s skin crawl. He doesn’t shake it off. 

“I don’t suppose killing the Joker is on the table?” Jason shoots back, knowing what he’s always known — that it isn’t, that it never will be, that he used to be okay with that, before the red of the explosion and the black of the grave and the green of the pit and the crimson of the blood he spilled for Talia and for Ra’s. 

Bruce shakes his head. “You used to believe in me, before. I wish, I _hope_ , that we can get there again. Without having to commit any capital crimes along the way.” 

Jason flinches. Bruce pulls away, and Jason laces his own hands behind his neck and pulls, pressing his face harder into his knees until his head starts to hurt with a normal, human, natural pain. He hopes maybe it will drown out the migraine that pulses higher in intensity with every moment that passes without violence, without revenge. 

The pain skyrockets at the sound of a door slamming deep in the cave, and footsteps thundering down the stairs from the manor. They're too fast, too loud, too angry to be Alfred. 

Bruce stands before Jason has a chance to even uncurl, and places himself in front of Jason, blocking the view but also screaming a silent statement of support. Of protection. _Proof_. 

Jason doesn't know how the fuck to react to that. Then the medbay doors slide open, and Dick Grayson runs in, and suddenly Jason has bigger problems. 

Because Dick, clearly, is freaking the _fuck_ out. Hair windblown, cheeks red and chapped, like he never managed to put on his motorcycle helmet before zooming into Gotham from wherever the hell he lives nowadays. Chest heaving. Eyes wide and wild. 

"What happened? Is Tim okay? Why are all the Cave access points under lockdown?" he asks, question after question without sparing a moment for breath or answers, not noticing Jason in the second bed, not seeming to notice anything at all outside his panic and rage. 

Jason can relate. 

"Tim is fine," Bruce says, like he's talking to a startled horse about to trample him. It's annoyingly similar to the tone he used with Jason earlier. "No permanent damage." 

"No permanent damage?" Dick demands. "No permanent damage? Is that supposed to make me feel better? How long was he even missing? Why didn't you call me?" 

"You're on medical leave," Bruce says. 

Dicks snorts disdainfully. "I'm on _psychiatric_ leave, no thanks to you. I can still do the job! How long would you have waited to call me for help? A week? Two weeks? A month? Before or after it stops being a rescue and becomes a recovery mission?" 

Bruce is silent for a long moment, watching Dick. "You're on leave. How did you find out something happened to Tim?" 

Dick groans and throws himself in the chair on the far side of Tim's bed. He leans it back to balance on two legs. Then one leg. "We set up a system. We know exactly what you're like, B. A text message every three days. No response by day four, a physical check." 

"And you think that's reasonable?" Bruce asks. 

" _I don't know_ , Bruce!" Dick shouts, voice breaking. "It's been four years since the Joker killed Jason and it's been six months since I killed the Joker and everything still feels like it happened yesterday and I can't, I can't handle your emotional constipation right now—" 

Jason's vision tunnels — Bruce has stepped forward, has pulled Dick into a tight hug, tucking Dick's face into his neck like Dick is eight years old instead of twenty-something, and Dick is _sobbing_ — but Jason barely sees any of it, barely comprehends the words they're saying, barely feels the bedsheets on his skin, barely tastes the dryness of his mouth, barely notices himself ask, "You… you killed the Joker?" 

Dick's head shoots up. His skin goes grey. His sights land on Jason. 

And where Tim's eyes had shone with wonder, and Bruce's with hope, Dick's flash with something like fear. Something close to terror. 

"No," Dick says, shoving at Bruce's shoulders and backing away. It's not an answer to Jason's question. It's a denial of Jason's entire being. 

Dick doesn't look away, it's as if he _can't_ look away, but he directs his next words to Bruce. "I can't, I— B, I think I'm— maybe you were right to leave me out of this one— I'm, I'm not—" 

"You're not hallucinating," Bruce says sternly. He steps back, giving Dick space. Room to panic. To _flip out_ , as Jason used to joke. 

"Pretty sure I am," Dick says. 

"What did you say about killing the Joker?" Jason asks. His feet are cold. He realizes he's out of the bed again. Standing up. Staring back just as hard at Dick 

"Jay, you're not helping," Bruce warns. 

"I don't fucking care," Jason says. No, shouts. He's shouting again, shouting to be heard through that viscous green fog. "What did he mean? I saw the Joker living and breathing and torturing Tim _last night_ , so what the fuck is he talking about?" 

Dick is shaking. He edges, slowly, back over to Tim's bed, eyes tracking back and forth between Jason and Bruce, like he's not sure either or both of them are real. He reaches Tim's side, gets a hand on the pulse point in Tim's wrist, and relaxes by a fraction. 

"There was…. an incident," Bruce explains, even as Dick mumbles, _Don't talk to the hallucination, B, you'll only encourage it_. "We were under the impression Tim had been killed under the Joker's orders. We overreacted." 

Dick closes his eyes for a moment, defeat writ large across his expression and posture. "He was taunting me about Jason, so I beat him to death with my bare hands, Bruce. That's a _hell_ of an 'overreaction.'" 

Jason should feel relieved. 

Someone out there cares enough about him to do what needs to be done. Someone — no, not just someone, but his self-professed older brother, a member of his family, one of the few people who has ever said _I love you_ to Jason's face and presumably meant it — took vengeance literally into his own hands and killed the man who killed Jason with a crowbar and a smile. 

Dick did that. Dick avenged him. So why doesn't Jason feel better? 

"If you… killed the Joker…." Jason asks slowly, "then how. How is he still alive?" 

"Jay…" Bruce says, and Jason suddenly knows, but he's got to twist the knife in his own heart anyway, he's got to ask. 

"How is he still alive, Bruce?" Jason demands, spinning away from Dick to stare Bruce down. 

Bruce looks at him. Just… just looks at him. Jason wishes to God he could read the expression on his face, could know what it _means_ , because there's no way Bruce still loves him, there's no way Bruce still cares, if the Joker was that close to being put in the ground and instead, "Huntress and I revived him." 

"You revived him?" Jason screams. He grabs the closest thing within reach — a tray on the medical table next to him — and flings it at Bruce's head. Then he throws the next closest thing, and the next, and the next. "You revived him? He killed me, he was dead, and you _revived him_?" 

Bruce closes his eyes, but otherwise lets every hit land. 

Arms wrap around Jason from behind, and normally he'd have them instantly broken and possibly removed from the body they belong to, but they belong to Dick, who is saying, "Jay, Jay, it's all right, calm down, c'mon Little Wing." 

And Jason knows he doesn't want to hurt Dick, knows he doesn't even really want to hurt Bruce, but the voice at the back of his mind is chanting that it'd be so, so much easier to just shoot them and be done with it, leave them lying bullet-ridden on the medbay floor for Alfred to discover later. Or for Tim to find the next time he wakes up. 

He breathes. And breathes. In his brother's arms, he breathes. 

Paranoia. Distrust. Violent urges. Delusions. Complete and utter preoccupation with revenge. 

"You revived him because… Because letting him die would put Nightwing in danger," Jason says, puzzling out a _different_ explanation from the one ricocheting through his mind. "The other rogues could've gone after him in revenge. The Gotham PD could arrest him, or blackmail both of you into… into ignoring corruption, or working certain cases and not others." 

He swallows down the anger. Says, "Letting him die would mean no more Nightwing. No more Robin. No more Batman." 

Bruce nods gravely. 

"Really?" Dick asks. "I thought you did it because you were, like, worried for my soul." 

"Your continued mental health was also a factor, yes," Bruce agrees stiffly. "You were already having a bad year. Suicide was not outside the realm of possibility." 

Dick lets go of Jason, at that, though he can feel Dick rest his head for a moment against the back of Jason's shoulder. "Yeah. There is that." 

"What the _fuck_ , Dick?" Jason turns. He grabs Dick by the shoulders, too roughly to be considered supportive, and gives him a hard shake. "What the fuck?" 

The look of terror is gone, finally. Now Dick's eyes are tired, and world-weary, and red from crying, but — but the hope and awe and wonder is there now, too. 

Dick gives him a watery smile. "I've missed you yelling at me, Jay." 

The Pit wants Jason to turn on this, to bleed it out, to use it and then to push it away before it can hurt him. 

_Jason_ wants something different. 

"Yeah, I've missed yelling at you, too, Dickwad." 

They're hugging before he knows it, but it's okay. It's good, even. Dick has always been a hugger. It's how he expresses love. 

They break apart. Jason glances up at Bruce, and immediately looks away again, his expression still too much to handle. It's no longer indecipherable. Jason knows exactly what it means. 

He looks back up. It's still there. 

"I believe you," Jason says, taking both Bruce and himself by surprise. "You don't… you don't have to prove anything to me." 

Bruce steps closer to him, body loose and unthreatening except for the way he's holding his breath. He probably doesn't even realize he's doing it. "Permission to try anyway?" 

"Yeah, yeah," Jason says. He gestures at his head. "Just remind me I said this the next time my brain goes all… Pit-crazy." 

"I will," Bruce says. 

"Wait, Pit Madness? Is that how — oh no, really?" Dick interrupts, dismay back in his voice. "Jay, I'm so sorry." 

"You've reached your quota of hugs for today," Jason warns him before he can reapproach with open arms. "You want another one, you ask someone else." 

"What _happened_?" 

Jason rubs his face with his palms. He realizes, once again, the thing about his feet and the cold floor. "If we're going to have _that_ conversation, then I demand we relocate upstairs where it's warm and there's booze." 

"You're underage." 

Jason levels Bruce with a familiar glare. "I have been brutally murdered, brought back to life, gone crazy, been trained as an assassin by _your ex-girlfriend_ , killed more people than I remember, punched Alfred _on the mouth_ , and came up with an elaborate plan to force you to commit murder to prove that you love me, but it's the _underage drinking_ you take issue with?" 

"We have rocky road," Bruce replies. 

"Fine," Jason agrees. He glances over at Tim. "Do you think your Replacement Robin will want some when he wakes up?" 

"There's no replacing you, Jason," Bruce says, and leads the way to the kid's bedside, hand on Jason's shoulder. "Also, he's been awake since Dick arrived." 

"Playing possum can be an effective short-term strategy," Tim says, voice still slurred from the pain medication. "But Bruce, Bruce, listen…. If you really want to fix Gotham, why don't you run for mayor?" 

"Pardon?" Bruce asks, nonplussed. 

"What is _in_ this IV?" Dick asks, inspecting the bag. 

"No, listen, you guys, listen!" Tim insists, flailing his hand at the nearest person, who happens to be Jason. "You run for mayor, right? You win, and then you just tax yourself to high heaven, and use the proceeds to institute universal basic income and universal healthcare. And then..." 

He makes a gesture with both hands, imitating an explosion. "Boom. Gotham saved." 

Jason looks from Tim, over to Dick, and back up to Bruce. "Still just want rocky road?" 

Bruce sighs. 

"We have some Bailey's in the fridge." 

*

**Author's Note:**

> Quick note -- my knowledge of Batman canon comes from the following sources:
> 
>   * Michael Keaton's Batman
>   * George Clooney & Chris O'Donnell's Batman & Robin (which I just rewatched last week and y'know what, it was a fuckin' delight you guise I highly recommend a re-watch, it was made in those glorious 5 minutes in the late 90's when non-toxic masculinity was a thing, the whole movie is about Familial Love)
>   * What I remember from watching Batman: The Animated Series when it originally aired Back In The Day
>   * 47 viewings of Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker
>   * 1 viewing of Batman: Under the Red Hood
> 

> 
> I have a sprained ankle so positive comments are very much appreciated. <3


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